The Uganda Communications Commission will be celebrating two decades come October, 2018. UCC was established by the Uganda Communications Act 1997 which was later amended and consolidated in 2013. UCC achievements at 20 are really astonishing, but they could do better too.
The Commission has spent most of the journey from 1997 trying to find common ground where service providers and consumers prevail excellently. UCC was operating almost in the background for so many years. The last 3 years have put the UCC under so much public focus. The commission called 2018 a transformative year after it passed on so many directives.
Many may fault it for some of these directives such as SIM card sale ban, blocking some live TV broadcasts, closing some radio and TV stations and turning off counterfeit phones. However, below we are going to share some of the achievements of UCC at 20 years of existence.
UCC Achievements at 20 in Numbers.
292 – Radio stations with 100% FM sound coverage
23 – Public Infrastructure Providers.
34 – Public Service Providers of voice and data.
4 – Digital Satellite TV providers.
24 – Free to Air TV stations.
18 – Digital Terrestrial Television Transmitters for Free To Air television.
24 – Postal and Courier services.
800 – School ICT Labs supported with science digital content.
85% – Percentage of government schools where UCC facilitated establishment of school ICT Labs.
24,000,000 – Mobile and Fixed telephony subscribers.
23,000,000 – Mobile money registered subscriptions.
17 – Trillions worth of mobile money transactions every 3 months.
16,300 – Registered mobile money agents in the country.
15 – Million people using the internet, up and on 10 million in 2016.
10% – Percentage that ICT contributes to the GDP.
Other UCC Achievements.
- Progressive penetration of ICT infrastructure into Education, Agriculture, Health and Governance through RCDF.
- Protection of crucial infrastructure and users through the CERT.
- Installed a Central Data Respiratory System that processes all information from licensees on a web-based platform.
- Digital logger: A 24 hour real time back storage for all broadcast content.
- Installed quality of service monitoring equipment.
- Support for local content and innovations.
- A stable and regulatory environment.
- Increased investment in the communication sector.
- Increased compliance in the sector.
- Digital migration.
- Extension of communication services through opening regional offices.
- Reduction of costs in the communication services.
Uganda currently ranks at 152 in the global ICT development index, according to International Telecom Union.
